Hiring a Consultant? 4 Steps to Success

Facing political and financial headwinds, nonprofit leaders are reaching out to consulting services more than ever. Executives are searching for expert guidance to contend with the unprecedented challenges of frozen federal funding coupled with rising expenses, increasing program demand, and evolving work-force needs.

But before you hit the “help” button, ask yourself: Is our organization truly ready for a consultant? It’s not just about having a problem to solve — it’s about having the internal clarity, leadership, and capacity to make the most of outside support. Do you have a leader empowered to make decisions, set priorities, and guide the work? Are you ready to invest time and attention, not just dollars? A consultant can bring expertise, structure, and a fresh perspective — but they can’t fill a vacuum.

Without clear direction, shared commitment, and a point person to oversee the relationship, even the best consultant will struggle to gain traction. As a nonprofit strategy adviser, I see far too many clients enter a consulting contract without realizing that the process will require work on both sides. It’s a partnership, not a hand-off.

Hiring a consultant can be one of the most transformative decisions a nonprofit makes — or one of the most frustrating. Done well, it’s a catalyst for clarity, alignment, and momentum. Done poorly, it results in a beautifully written, expensive report that gathers dust. The difference often comes down to how the organization approaches the relationship.

Below are four critical steps to take before you hire a consultant, so that when the work begins, everyone’s set up to succeed.

Determine what you need — and budget for it.

Before you bring on a consultant, take the time to define what you’re trying to accomplish. This doesn’t mean you need a fully built workplan, but you should be able to articulate the core challenge you’re facing and the outcome you want. You should also identify any constraints, like a tight deadline, staff bandwidth, or stakeholder expectations. A short request for proposals or written scope (two pages is plenty) will give both you and the consultant something concrete to respond to and build from.

That clarity also helps ensure the work will be within budget. We often see nonprofits outline ambitious goals — like organizational redesign, a community-engagement strategy, or a new earned-revenue model — but allocate insufficient funding for the turnkey solution they expect. It’s not necessarily about spending more, but about aligning what you want with what you’re willing to invest.

Consultants can absolutely help you phase the work or sharpen the scope to meet your budget. But without realistic funding for the depth of engagement you need, even the best consultant will be forced to operate in the shallow end. If you want a thoughtful, rigorous process, it needs to be both clearly defined and adequately supported before the work begins.

Communicate the process internally so the chain of command is clear.

Hiring a consultant can’t fix chaos. It can help bring structure to complexity, but only if your organization is ready to engage. That means more than just having a point person. It means leadership alignment, decision-making protocols, and clear communication across the team.

We’ve seen this play out the hard way. One large health nonprofit brought us in for a planning process during a period of leadership transition. The chief operating officer had stepped down, and an interim leader was put in place lacking a clear mandate. Without decision-making power at the top or clarity on direction, the work stalled. Meetings went in circles, and we spent weeks revisiting the same questions with different stakeholders. In the end, we had to extend the contract just to get to a baseline of alignment.

Just as problematic, but quieter, is when the internal team is kept in the dark. Staff or board members may not know why a consultant has been brought in, how the process will unfold, or what’s expected of them. That lack of transparency breeds anxiety and slows momentum.

In one of our smoothest engagements, a social-services umbrella organization and my firm co-created a one-page overview before kickoff. It laid out our role, the goals of the engagement, and what each group could expect. It took just one hour to create and saved weeks of confusion later.

Ask the right questions, both before and after you hire.

Vetting a consultant’s credentials is important, but so is understanding how they work. Too often, organizations skip past the questions that most helpfully signal whether a consultant will be a good partner.

During the interview phase, go beyond bios and boilerplate. Ask questions like:

• How have you handled a client whose needs changed midway through the process?
• What’s your approach to building buy-in across a diverse team?
• How do you communicate when something isn’t working — or when we’re off track?

These questions aren’t about getting the “right” answers. They reveal how the consultant thinks on their feet, how they navigate complexity, and how honest and transparent they’ll be in a real partnership.

Then, once the work begins, don’t skip the conversation about how you’ll work together. Use the kickoff meeting to align on communication rhythms, check-in cadences, how hours will be tracked, how to flag risks early, and how to talk about scope changes before they become surprises. These agreements create a strong container for the work, so that energy goes into solving the problem, not managing the process.

My firm once worked with an arts nonprofit eager to boost earned revenue in the face of declining donations. But a quick round of interviews revealed the real issue: The executive director was heading for the exit, and there was no succession plan in place to backfill this mission-critical role.

Thankfully, we had discussed the possibility of shifts to our scope during the kickoff meeting and established a good working relationship with the board chair. As a result, we were able to quickly reallocate hours to developing a succession-planning strategy. Had we skipped the upfront conversation to set goals, the project would have likely stalled, and the nonprofit might have been left without a leader at a critical time.

Prepare thoughtfully and partner fully.

Hiring a consultant can be a turning point — but only if you’ve done the prep work to make the relationship successful. That requires defining your needs and aligning your budget. It also means ensuring your internal team is informed, equipped, and ready to engage. And it means choosing a partner with eyes wide open, asking the right questions, naming your expectations, and setting the foundation for real collaboration.

The truth is, great consulting work isn’t magic. It’s built on clarity, trust, and shared responsibility. If you’re willing to invest in the relationship from the start, the return will be both a solution and a stronger, more aligned, and more resilient organization.